Pure fiction

If the work had met with the fate of 19 out of 20 of the novels published now-a-days, I might have been well content to let it sink into oblivion, with its false statements unchallenged, and its doubtful logic unquestioned; but, possessing an internal force and vitality far above mediocrity, it has reached that height of a novel writer's ambition, a third edition, thus showing that it is being well read, and, consequently, that its errors have become dangerous.

The authoress of this truthful tale of Manchester life acknowledges that the interests of both masters and men are really the same; and if her intention were to get both parties to act together for their mutual benefit it would have been well to have considered whether her book would have that tendency or not.

As a whole the tale is beautifully written; the characters are graphically delineated; the events are so interestingly interwoven, and the groundwork is so artistically constructed, that whoever reads the two first chapters is sure to read the whole. The only fault of the book is that the authoress has sinned gravely against truth, in matters of fact either above her comprehension, or beyond her sphere of knowledge.

But to return to the story. At the meeting, a shilling a week more was offered (by the way, power-loom weavers were never paid by the week, but by the piece), which the men refused and the meeting broke up. Before however, the deputation left the room, Harry Carson found time to draw a caricature of the five miserable workmen who composed it, which he handed round to the other mill-owners who chuckled over it and were highly amused.

One of the men got hold of it and it caused such exasperation among the workmen that they resolved to murder young Carson, and he was murdered. Every feeling of grief and tenderness in the heart of old Carson was totally absorbed by the thirst for revenge, to be gratified by the immediate punishment of Jem Wilson, the supposed murderer, whom he wished to see executed before his son was consigned to his grave.

Can the authoress believe this to convey a truthful impression of Manchester life? It is a libel on the workmen of Manchester; they never committed a murder under any such circumstances. It is a libel on the masters, merchants and gentlemen of this city, who have never been exceeded by those of any other part of the kingdom in acts of benevolence and charity, both public and private.

In a truthful "tale of Manchester, or factory life," it appears very strange that no notice whatever is taken of what has been done by the masters for improving the condition of the workmen - for instance, of the day and Sunday schools attached to many mills, and where this is not the case, of the inducements held out for their becoming subscribers to extensive libraries founded expressly for their benefit, or to mechanics' institutions.

Nothing is said of the parks which have been purchased, and laid out exclusively for their recreation and enjoyment, where thousands of happy and intelligent faces may be seen on Saturday afternoons and on holidays, delighting themselves in innocent games or athletic exercises, nor (when the mills are stopped for the want of a market) of the many instances in which the masters advance their workpeople a weekly sum for their subsistence. Not one word of all these is there in this "true tale of Manchester life."